14. Installing and Uninstalling Configured Packages

Have you ever seen a package where, once built, you were expected to
keep the build tree around forever, and always cd there before
running the tool? You might have to cast your mind way, way back to the
bad old days of 1988 to remember such a horrible thing.

The GNU Autotools provides a canned solution to this problem. While not
without flaws, it does provide a reasonable and easy-to-use framework.
In this chapter we discuss how the GNU Autotools installation model, how to
convince automake to install files where you want them, and
finally we conclude with some information about uninstalling, including
a brief discussion of its flaws.